rabindranath tagore. deconstructed

8/9/2019 Rabindranath Tagore. Deconstructed

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111DECONSTRUCTING RABINDRANATH TAGORE

Deconstructing Rabindranath Tagore

Haydee A. Dabritz

Faculty Sponsor: Lalita Pandit, Department of English

ABSTRACT:Deconstruction is a genre of literary criticism that investigates hidden or paradoxi-

cal meanings within literary texts. It seeks to intertwine two hermeneutical

approaches: uncovering the stable truths of a work, and then looking for ways in

which these truths can be subverted. Its principal advocate, Jacques Derrida, claims

that fixed interpretations of texts are unattainable, and all texts are composed ofinherently unstable elements.

I intend to examine three works by Rabindranath Tagore using deconstructive

methodology to explore husband-wife conflicts. These conflicts are expressed in

the wider realm of socio-legal-political systems. The terms into which these con-

flicts articulate themselves fit into the various types of binary oppositions

employed by deconstructionists, and ultimately invert the accepted hierarchy (in

this case, male superiority). I also aim to expose destabilizing elements in the text,

and demonstrate that certain enigmas arise from a critical analysis.

The juxtaposition of opposites and the infinite potential for free play within a

literary text are characteristics that attract literary critics to deconstruction as ananalytical tool. They also restrain a literary critic from believing a particular inter-

pretation with too great a degree of finality.

INTRODUCTION:Deconstruction as a movement in literary theory began as a reaction to structuralist inter-

pretations of literature, especially those proposed by Claude Levi-Strauss and Ferdinan de

Saussure. Whereas structuralists perceive certain signs and images in texts as providing

definitive meanings, deconstructionists believe that meanings are disseminated, and fixed

interpretations of literary texts are unattainable. Though deconstruction has frequently been

criticized for its inability to provide conclusions about the import of a particular work, it is avaluable tool for exposing dichotomies within texts, as well as restraining the literary critic

from believing a particular analysis with too great a degree of finality. Deconstruction facili-

tates a hermeneutical approach that exposes ambiguities and multiplicities of meaning.

Vincent Leitch writes inDeconstructive Criticism, It aims to decipher the stable truths of a

work, employing conventional passive tactics of reading; it seeks to question and subvert

such truths in an active production of enigmatic undecidables (4). With this premise, I will

examine the two plays, Sacrifice and The King and the Queen, by Rabindranath Tagore, and

the short story, Punishment.

DISCUSSION:These three texts center about the conflict between a man and a woman. Deconstruction

defines such opposing forces as binary oppositions, with one traditionally ranked above the

other. In the logocentrism of Western European thought, the male occupies the superior eche-


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112 DABRITZ

lon. Deconstructionists attempt to subvert established hierarchies by elevating the inferior

classification to a superior status. I will examine three scenarios in Tagores works where

women act powerfully. In The King and the Queen, Queen Sumitra defies her husband, King

Vikram, by involving herself in matters of state and taking politics into her own hands. In theshort story Punishment, a wife fails to follow her husbands instructions in a murder case;

and finally, in Sacrifice, Queen Gunavati disobeys King Govindas decree abolishing animal

sacrifice for the goddess Kali.

The action in Punishment unfolds thus: two peasant brothers and their wives share liv-

ing accommodations. The short-tempered, slovenly wife, Radha, is killed by her husband,

Dukhiram, in a fit of temper for failing to prepare the evening meal. The village chief

intrudes on the scene immediately following the murder, and the other brother, Chidam,

unwittingly identifies his beautiful wife, Chandara, as the perpetrator. Prior to her imprison-

ment pending trial, Chidam instructs Chandara to lie to protect her brother-in-law. At this

point, dichotomies in the male/female hierarchy emerge. Before this catastrophe, despite theirlove for each other, Chandara and Chidam have quarreled. Chandara suspected her husband

of infidelity, so began flirting at the watering hole. He then threatened her bodily harm and

locked her in the house. She escaped to a relatives house, but was persuaded to return only

after Chidam had to surrender to her. Tagore relates, It was as hard to restrain his wife as

to hold a handful of mercury, but contradicts this description with the assertion that Chidam

did not have to use force any more to control his wife. Chandara has achieved a sort of

power by submission, itself a paradox. Where the balance of power lies in this relationship is

uncertain.

The chain of events after the murder further exposes this complexity. The agreement

between husband and wife is that Chidam will save Chandara from execution, while sheacquiesces to his lie. Chidam expects Chandara to relate that her sister-in-law attacked her

and the sister-in-law was killed in self-defense. After being taken into custody by the police,

Chandara tells them the attack was unprovoked and puts her own life at risk by defying her

husband. She wields the ultimate weapon of sedition by refusing to see him before her execu-

tion, contemptuously exclaiming, To hell with him. She accepts the injustice of a

punishment for a crime she did not commit in order to punish Chidam for forcing her into an

intolerable position and will not give him the satisfaction of saving her. Chidam gets her to

take the blame for the crime but is unable to achieve the outcome he desiresgetting his

wife back. In the male/female hierarchy, Chandara seems to have the last word.

This reasoning is less conclusive than it appears. A deconstructionist approach demandsfurther scrutiny. At some level, Chandara has obeyed, by sacrificing herself for family honor.

She bears the punishment for disobeying her husbands instructions. She is not able to save

herself, so her defiance is a hollow victory. Chidam has achieved his goal of getting his

brother off. Earlier in the narrative, Chidam acknowledged, If I lose my wife, I can get

another, and contemplated that Chandaras demise would bring peace to the house.

Chandara can be seen as a victim of male authority, despite her attempts to thwart it. These

questions demonstrate the inherent instability of Tagores text, a feature deconstructionists

perceive at the heart of all literary works.

Punishment also demonstrates the instability of the concept of truth. The lie initially

suggested by Chidam to protect his brother-in-law is accepted as the truth, and the real storyis used to refute the lie. The village chief advises Chidam to say what actually happened,

which Chidam cannot, having already corrupted the truth. Derrida would laud the manner in


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which lie and truth dance around one another in the story. Chidams problem is that his wife

will not go along with the lie concocted to save her. She insists on yet another lie, one

designed to defy Chidam and incriminate herself. Chidam correctly accuses her of lying, but

is caught in a trap from which he cannot extricate himself. Ironically, when Dukhiram con-fesses to the crime in court in a last-ditch effort to save his sister-in-law, the judge does not

believe him because his statement contradicts the evidence already heard. Dukhirams protes-

tations of his sister-in-laws innocence serve only to convince the court of her culpability,

reversing the notion that the truth shall set you free. What constitutes a legal fact in the

eyes of the court, for all intents and purposes, is the truth.

While the male/female binary opposition in Punishment projects its conflict into local

politics and the legal system, a similar conflict in The King and the Queen expands into the

national arena, bringing state and family into opposition. Traditionally, a political rule is

expected to place family obligations in abeyance to those of the state. Tagore reverses the

male/female roles, presenting a king who ignores problems within his kingdom because ofexcessive devotion to his wife, Queen Sumitra. She is moved by the outbreak of famine to

take military action against the provincial governors responsible for it. Her actions remind us

of Antigone, who under penalty of death defies her uncle, King Creon, and performs burial

rites for her rebel brother. But Queen Sumitras commitment is to the welfare of her king-

dom, not her family. Tagore reverses the traditional viewpoint consigning the primary

responsibility of women to their families. The results, however, are disastrous, so we cannot

be sure Tagore truly advocates reversal of the female role. The kingdom is plunged into civil

war, as Queen Sumitra aligns with her brother against her own husband. This outcome

demonstrates that subversion of the traditional hierarchy is dangerous.

Similar consequences occur as the result of the male/female conflict in Sacrifice, where ahusband-wife quarrel is projected into a struggle between the authority of church and state.

King Govinda decides to abolish animal sacrifice after seeing a distraught child lamenting

the sacrifice of her pet goat in the temple. This unilateral decision pits him against his chief

priest and wife. In Tagores time, religion dominated politics. In this play, the effects of sub-

verting the accepted hierarchy are as devastating as the projection of the male/female conflict

in The King and the Queen. In a classic decontructive twist, the decree designed to lessen

bloodshed actually promotes it.

The premise that innocent blood will be shed when political or religious authorities act

autocratically exists at the margins of the text, unstated, yet present by its absence. This pres-

ence by absence is defined by deconstructionists as alterity, or non-presence. The goddessKali, around whose thirst for blood (need for sacrifice) the play revolves, similarly exists

beyond the boundaries of the text. In no instance does she speak during the play, but her

influence upon the principals is profound. Her presence beyond but within the text meets the

Derrida definition of a text without a true center. In deconstructionist criticism, the lack of

center allows free play within the system. It permits a text to be no longer a finished corpus

of writing, some content enclosed in a book or its margins, but a differential network, a fabric

of traces referring endlessly to something other than itself, to other differential traces (2).

According to Derrida, the works of great writers necessarily go beyond the boundaries

demarcated by their content. J. Hillis Miller expands this concept when he states that great

works of literature are likely to be ahead of their critics (5), and will, in fact, anticipate anydeconstruction the critic can achieve.

Contemplate the goddess Kalithe ultimate binary opposition incorporated within a sin-

gle entity. She is associated with both destruction (war and bloodshed) and creation


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114 DABRITZ

(fertility). She is represented as a black woman with four arms, the left hands holding a

sword and the head of a slain demon, the right hands conferring knowledge and making the

mudras of fear not. She symbolizes the necessity of accepting pain and sorrow in human

existence and persuades humans to act fully in the moment, free of the fear of death. Theconflict between King Govinda and Queen Gunavati erupts into a struggle over life and

death. The purpose of the Queens animal sacrifice is to help her conceive a child. The pur-

pose of the Kings abolishment of sacrifice is to spare the needless death of animals. The

enigma of Kali and the paradoxes that surround her in the play epitomize the deconstructive

idea of diffrance. According to Leitch (4), diffrance encompasses the following qualities:

1) to differ to be unlike in nature, quality or form, 2) differre (Latin) to disperse or

scatter, 3) to defer to postpone or delay. Diffrance is, however, neither a word nor a

concept, according to Derrida (3). It refers to the origin or production of differences, and

the differences between differences, the play of differences. It is the nonfull, nonsimple

origin; it is the structured and differing origin of differences. Finally, it is the subversionof every realm that threatens to undermine all texts, because certain assumptions are made

by the author or reader before (s)he ever begins writing or reading the text. Diffrance ques-

tions the source of these preconceived origins.

A similar analysis can be applied to the issue of divine revelation in Sacrifice. At some

point in time, the goddess Kali required animal sacrifice in return for celestial favors. King

Govinda claims to have received divine revelation to the contrary and states, Gods words

are above all laws. Indeed all religious practices are based on commandments from divine

authority, and the source of divine authority is revelation. The ability to receive revelation is

claimed by an individual based on spiritual knowledge conferred upon the individual by the

deity. King Govinda explains the basis for his decree thus: Mother (Kali) came to me, in agirls disguise, and told me that blood she cannot suffer. Man or woman becomes the

mouthpiece for god, and the veracity of the source of the revelation cannot be determined.

This is diffrance. The revelation becomes unstable because King Govinda cannot testify he

has spoken directly to Kali and claims she was disinclined to the custom of sacrifice and

kept her face averted. Not only is the origin of revelation in question, but revelation itself

presents the notion of supplementarity. Derrida proposes that the specific case depends on the

general case, but the general case is part of the specific. Supplementarity is an elusive con-

cept existing at the center of binary oppositions. Religious laws rely on revelation received

by select individuals and transmitted into law. Gods words are not above laws, as King

Govinda states, they are laws. Revelation is law, and law is revelation. In Of Grammatology(1), Derrida explains supplementarity as follows:

Supplementarity, which is nothing, neither a presence nor an absence, is neither a sub-

stance nor an essence of man. It is precisely the play of presence and absence, the opening of

this play that no metaphysical or ontological concept can comprehend.

Lastly, I will consider the character of Jaising in Sacrifice. Jaising is a child servant to the

chief priest and has lived in the temple since infancy. He is initially portrayed as a devotee of

the goddess, but inconsistencies soon become apparent. He pledges to help the servant girl

save her pet goat from sacrifice, against the wishes of his sacerdotal mentor and the goddess

he worships. He appears to worship King Govinda (as his full moon) more devoutly than

Kali, but offers to help the priest murder King Govinda to restore animal sacrifice in the tem-ple. This brings about another contradiction, since he has promised the girl to rescue her

goat. He cannot decide which authority is more compellingman or god (another binary


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opposition). The voice he hears from behind Kalis altar is identified by King Govinda as that

of the priest, but whether that voice is Kalis or not, Jaising says, It is all the same. At the

end of the play, he kills himself to appease a goddess whom he has come to doubt. His

actions present a paradox. He is innocent but wise beyond his years. He loves too much, ornot enough. In his character is a shifting play of loyalties as diverse as the jungle.

This richness and potential for infinite free play are what attract literary critics to decon-

struction as an analytical tool. Deconstruction provides them with endless opportunities to

analyze and re-analyze great works of literature. It causes them to be skeptical about fixed

interpretations and opens their minds to the ambiguities of literary texts. In the works of

Tagore I have examined, it encourages more insightful analyses, answers questions, and rais-

es new ones.

WORKS CITEDDerrida, Jacques. (1968).La diffrance. Bulletin de la Societie Francaise de Philosophie.

62:73-101.

Derrida, Jacques. (1976). Of Grammatology. Ed. Trans. Gayatri Sprivak Chakravorty.

Baltimore. John Hopkins University Press. 154; 244.

Derrida, Jacques. (1979). Living on: border lines.Deconstruction and Criticism. Ed.

Harold Bloom, et.al. New York: Seabury Press. 83-84

Leitch, Vincent B. (1983). Extensions of Subversion.In Deconstructive Criticism: An

Advanced Introduction. New York.: Columbia University Press.

Miller, Hillis J. (1975). Deconstructing the Deconstructors.Diacritics 5:24-31.

Tagore, Rabindranath. (1961). The Tagore Reader. Ed. Amiya Chakravarty. Boston: Beacon

Press.


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